New Need for Speed, Plants vs. Zombies, and Titanfall Due This Year

New entries in the Need for Speed, Plants vs. Zombies, and Titanfall franchises are on the way. EA confirmed that we’d been seeing these games be available this year. This was confirmed in the company’s earnings call. While the exact names weren’t revealed, obviously saving them for events like EA Play, it should offset what appeared to be a poor showing last quarter, what with the likes of FIFA 19 and Battlefield V underperforming. Earlier this week, EA released Apex Legends, a battle royale game set in the Titanfall universe but not a sequel to Titanfall 2.

“We will drive the Titanfall universe forward with Apex Legends live service and a premium game later in the year,” said EA CFO Blake Jorgesen. “We will launch Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, a new Plants vs. Zombies shooter, and a new Need for Speed. We have modest expectations for Battlefield and Anthem live services given that they are not yet proven. We continue to refine mobile live services and work on new games.”

It will be interesting to see if the aforementioned Titanfall game ends up being Titanfall 3. Earlier, developer Respawn claimed it wasn’t in the works.

“The world thinks we’re making Titanfall 3 and we’re not – this is what we’re making,” said Apex Legends Producer Drew McCoy in an interview with Eurogamer. “To try and convince a skeptical audience for months with trailers and hands-on articles, we’re just like, ‘Let the game speak for itself’ – it’s the most powerful antidote to potential problems. We’re doing a free to play game, with essentially loot boxes, after we were bought by EA, and it’s not Titanfall 3. It’s the perfect recipe for a marketing plan to go awry, so why have that – let’s just ship the game and let players play.”

Furthermore, Kotaku who has been accurate in the past, states that Titanfall 3 was cancelled for Apex Legends.

“What was once Titanfall 3 has become Apex Legends, the free-to-play battle royale game that launched today,” writes Kotaku’s Jason Schreier. “In other words, a third Titanfall is not currently in development, despite the critical acclaim for the first two.”

This was followed up by Schreier elaborating that according to his source, “third Titanfall was under way and that the studio was looking to get it out as quickly as possible, for fear of it looking and feeling dated if it came out too much later than 2018 (thanks to its use of the Valve-created Source engine).”

He speculated that either Apex Legends would be “a stopgap en route to a proper Titanfall 3” or “whatever work was done on Titanfall 3 has become Apex Legends” turns out EA and Respawn opted for the latter.